Work Text:
Friday, March 30, 1958
9 p.m. at Sal's Cafe
Bess pushed her veal marsala from one side of her plate to the other, feeling the vibrations of her fork scrape across the bottom of the plate. The place checked off all the requisite Italian restaurant requirements: checkered table cloth, candle in an old wine bottle, violin player sawing away at a classical reinterpretation of “That’s Amore.” But the brown sauce, and the meat it was congealing around, was inedible. It was the sort of food that begged the question “why not stay in and cook at home?”
“I said, don’t you think, Bess honey? You follow that stuff, dontcha?”
Bess looked up at her friend Dori’s face, realizing she had drifted off daydreaming of a future far away from Killeen, away from her job at Fort Hood, away from the Army, away from officers, like the ones sitting across from them. Away from soldiers in general.
“What, Khrushchev? Well, I think we all knew he wasn’t going to take the threat laying down.”
Dori hit Bess' shoulder lightly, smiling at their dates, two officers from Army Intelligence.
“No, y’all will havta excuse my friend here, she still thinks she’s studying political science in Austin. You’d think a year of civilian life would make her normal again, huh?”
Dori flipped her blonde hair and drawled on.
“No, silly goose, no one here is interested in that Russian stuff, we’re talking about Mike Todd. What do you think poor Elizabeth Taylor is going to do now that her husband's dead?”
Bess tried very hard not to roll her eyes. Dori was right, she read the movie gossip magazines, but her friend’s distraught, serious expression had made her think they were discussing something with a little more gravitas. The recent atomic weapons testing, or Russian political shifts, the stuff at the top of her New York Times front page everyday. But why would any one in the Army want to talk about that?
Bess smiled at her date and tried to focus on the conversation at hand. Later in the bathroom, Dori chided her while applying a fresh coat of lipstick onto Bess’ mouth.
“I wish you would try to be polite.”
“Dori, you know I am breaking my rule here with you. I don’t date soldiers. I have two goals I'm focusing on: get into law school and shake off these twenty pounds. ”
Bess rubbed her hands over her waist.
“Rules were made to be broken, Bessie Pie, and you look great, men like a girl with a jiggle, I think you look like a brunette Jayne Mansfield.”
“Hardly. You’re Mansfield and Monroe rolled into one.”
“Don't sell yourself short. I know you were fixin' to marry that boy last year, and now all you talk about is law school this, politics that. Don’t you wanna get married? We're not getting any younger.”
“I’m twenty three. Same as you.”
“Eggg zactly. Sure, it seems young now, but you're gonna blink and be thirty and single, with nothing but your degrees to keep you company. You already have a good job now. I just know you’d set this law school thing aside if you met the right guy.”
“Of course I wanna get married, someday. But not now. You’re the one in a hurry to quit your job and settle down, not me.”
“I don’t have a job.”
“See, you’re half way there, Doreen. Me, I’m not giving up my goals for Captain Smarmy out there. How did you even meet these ones?”
Dori steadied her self on Bess’ shoulder.
“Stop moving, or this lipstick won’t be straight. I met them outside the PX, I thought they were cute. Arnie knew who you were, he was the one who suggested we all go out. He really likes you, I can tell - “
“Yeah, he was just in my pop's office lobbying for an assignment, he doesn’t like me. He is using me. There’s a difference, I shouldn’t have to tell you that.”
“So what if he was? Maybe he saw you there and couldn’t get you out of his mind. He’s good looking, smart, he’s already an O3 —”
Bess stopped her friend’s hand, and fixed her hair in the mirror, pushing up her bust and sighing at the rounder curves that had been widening at her waist since she’d graduated from college and settled into a very sedentary, very single, and currently very celibate life living back at home and working for her father. She turned to look at Dori who was waiting to blot Bess' lips with a tissue like the sweet girl she always had been. For Dori, a fresh coat of perfectly applied lipstick fixed all of life’s problems.
“Look, Captain whatever out there is only here for six months or so for training, then he's off to Heidelberg. That’s why I don’t date soldiers anymore. I’ve learned from my mistakes. I’m waiting for you to catch up.”
Bess gave her dark curls one last fluff.
“How’d you get these suckers to come out on a double date anyway? They aren’t scared of your father?”
Dori avoided eye contact as she smoothed her blonde bouffant and pursed her lips, then looked at Bess in the mirror.
“They don’t know.”
“How do they not know your father is the CO?”
Dori shrugged, then pinched Bess as they walked out of the ladies’ room.
“Don’t tell, ok? Let’s just have fun. What if you fall madly in Arnie? And he asked you to marry him and go to Germany with him?”
Bess snorted as they walked out to the men waiting for them in the restaurant lobby and Dori's eyes took on a knowing look.
“Hmm, so that’s big fat ol ‘no’ to dancing tonight, I’m guessin’?”
Bess nodded.
“Please at least tell me you aren’t going home to work on that boring research project?”
Bess smiled mischievously. “Professor Blotke agreed to help me, it’s going to be my submission sample for Georgetown. Papa took Mama to D.C. with him for his meetings, so I have the house practically to myself. It's just Kay and me, and she’s probably already asleep. I just have to grab a new typewriter back on post, I busted mine.”
Dori shook her disapproving of Bess’ plans for the night, then turned to greet their escorts with her usual vivacious pleasantries. Bess smiled at Dori's ability to interact with the men so casually and intimately, sliding her hands through both of officer's arms as they walked to the car. She considered how different she was from her girlfriend, despite the fact that they were both twenty three year old daughters of career Army officers. Every relationship she'd been in seemed to occur in spite of her inability to feel at ease or flirt with boys.
The conversation turned to recent events at Fort Hood as they walked.
“So,” Dori exhaled, squeezing herself against her date. “Has anyone seen Elvis yet?”
Bess pounded her foot a little harder into the concrete, hearing that name now provoked instant irritation.
“Ughh, no. It’s only been what, three days, and honestly I wish he’d been sent somewhere else for training. All I do is answer calls about him. It is driving me up the wall and I can’t get anything done. He’s turned the whole base upside down. Must have been a hundred cars parked outside the main gate, all scattered around the fields. It’s a security issue. I just —"
“Well, that’s not his fault Bess, and I think it's great. I wanna to meet him, don’t y’all?” Dori looked at the officers on her arms.
Arnie smiled a big dumb smile as he looked at Dori’s bouncing breasts and agreed. “I think it’s good for the Army, boy, I just - I just wish we could get the other enlisted to lay off him.”
“What do you mean?”
Bess felt the pit of her stomach tense as she thought of the thousands of green little boys running around base on edge with no external distractions for entertainment.
“Yeah, the boys’ have been giving him a hard time, shouting out when he runs during PT, or at the chow hall. There’s some concern he hasn’t been coming to eat all his meals cuz a the way they’ve been taunting him.”
Bess sighed, her irritation dissipating momentarily into sympathy as she considered how hungry and lonely Elvis Presley must be. Then she remembered that she was hungry, hungry because all the good restaurants had been filled up tonight by people trying to catch a glimpse of him. Elvis was the reason the only benefit from breaking her vow against dating a soldier, the free meal, had been a bust. She wondered if it was going to be this crazy around town for the next six months while he was here.
“I feel sorry for the poor kid, I do. But I still wish he was some other base’s problem.”
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Back on post, Arnie asked Bess for the fourth time if she wouldn’t like him to come help her carry the typewriter to her car. Then they could meet the others at the night club.
Beth pursed her lips with a demure smile. “I think I can handle a typewriter, Captain, I use them all day.”
Dori chimed in with a reminder that it was Friday night and they were only young once, but Bess put them off, grinning as she heard Dori exclaim that both men would just have to dance with her all night.
“Two gorgeous officers all to myself, what eva shall I do?”
Free at last, Bess drove her car to the supply building, and snuck in the back door carrying the type writer that she had been using at home, the big sticker along the bottom reading “Property of U.S. Army” evident as she held the machine under her arm to unlock the door. Bess slipped off her heels at the door so that they didn’t click down the dark hallways, and she easily scurried in to slip the broken machine into the repair center and help herself to a new model, grabbing a few spools of typewriter ribbon and a package of paper on the way out. Balancing everything as she locked up to leave, Bess smiled at the cool air on her sweaty arm pits and laughed to herself for pulling this stealth operation in a tight green cocktail dress and pumps.
“A better use of this outfit anyway, I’d say.” She muttered to herself, sheathing her right foot back into her white heel with a sense of pride that she’d managed to get in, get the new machine, and would probably be home before 11 p.m. Bess had propped her self up against the building to slip her left foot into the other shoe when she heard a voice behind her call out.
“Uh, hey, need any help there?”
Startled, she almost toppled over, catching herself at the last moment by dropping everything in her hands.
“OWW fuck fuck fuck a duck!
She screamed in pain as the typewriter clanged down on her bare left foot and she almost knocked heads with the tall, gangly soldier who squatted down on front of her at the same time to try and help her retrieve her supplies.
"Oh man, I sure am sorry, listen -"
“At ease, uh Private,” she glanced briefly at the rank on his uniform while straightening up, holding her foot in pain and taking in the view below her. The paper knob at the top of the new machine had broken off completely.
“Fuck, this is what I get, I suppose,” she laughed, looking up find herself across from the shy, inquisitive face of Elvis Presley.
“Oh fuck a duuuuuck.”
Bess forgot about the typewriter, the paper spilled everywhere, the throbbing pain in the left foot she was now holding up and cradling. She didn’t even notice how she was exposing her thighs until she rubbed her foot again and dropped it with a thud, realizing she was about to flash Elvis Presley. He seemed to realize it too, and smirked as he turned his face to look away as some sort of attempt to give her privacy while she smoothed her dress down. Bess did this while clumsily trying to balance between one heeled foot and one bare foot.
Elvis found it very hard to stifle his chuckles as he watched her stiffen, and held out his hand to put her at ease.
“Uh, hey there ma’am, I’m Elvis, Elvis Presley.”
Bess shifted and smiled awkwardly, wiping her dirty, sweaty hands on her silk dress and extending her right hand out to shake his. The the same right hand, that had, moments ago, been rubbing her smelly, left foot. Honestly, it seemed like the most polite option, since she decided to act as if the last five minutes hadn’t happened. As if sneaking out of the supply building past 10 p.m. on a Friday night with her arms full of government office supplies was perfectly normal.
“Bess Schwartz, I’m, uh, I work in the Front Office here. I’m, I’m, I'm the secretary for the Army Intelligence Commander.”
She gasped when Elvis took her hand, the hand cover in her foot sweat, and squeezed it warmly, bringing it to his lips for a chaste kiss.
“Nice ta, uh, meetcha. Imma sorry, uh, for startlin’ ya Miss Schwartz, ma’am.”
Bess shivered in the darkness as she heard herself whisper for him to call her Bess almost incoherently while she watched Elvis drop down in front of her and fit her other white pump over her left foot. She tried to remember how to breath. It was hard. Hard because she was struggling to subdue her visceral reaction to Elvis' thumb as it slowly smoothed over the top of her foot, which made it harder still to recover from the embarrassment of getting caught stealing a typewriter. By the most famous person in the world. Bess shut her eyes in disbelief that this was actually happening, and was disappointed when she lifted her eyelids to find that it actually was happening and Elvis was still there. He met her eyes, his finger delicately stroking her ankle.
“There, now, honey, you think you can walk?”
She pulled her leg back and nodded as she scanned the parking lot, the road along and other buildings behind it.
“Mhmm. Thank you, Private. Say, what are you doing stalking around the base right now? Lights out is at 9.”
Elvis bit his lip, looking at the ground as he stood.
“Can’t sleep.”
Bess arched her eyebrow as she started to bend, but Elvis put his hand up to stop her and stooped to gather the paper. He crushed it under his arm as he grabbed the typewriter and ink ribbons, talking slowly and deliberately.
“Well, my first night some jokers went an put shaving cream in my shoes, I ‘spose it gave em a good laugh to watch me run around like a damn fool getting ready for inspection. An well, I ain’t been able to sleep since, can’t bare to, uh, to uh - ”
His voice trailed off, but Bess knew what he meant. He was afraid of looking like poor sport or tattle tale if he complained, and a coward if he just took it. Her eyes narrowed as she noticed the bags under his eyes, calculating he must be going on 40 hours without much sleep. Or much food either, if her date was to be believed. Men. Boys, more like. Little boys amusing them selves by torturing this poor kid. This, tall, lanky, kid, who hovered above her and whose large hands made her typewriter ribbon look like a checker piece.
“Yeah, uh, they’re just scared they won’t be able to get any tail now that your here.” She smiled as best she could under the pressure of trying to talk with Elvis smoldering, lonely boy eyes piercing through her.
Bess looked at a passing car just so she could collect herself, then back at Elvis, thinking of the crowds of women lining the gates.
“The men should be thanking you, we haven’t seen this many pretty girls hanging around the base, since, well, since ever. Probably gonna be easy picking, especially for the soldiers who can leave post. Those poor girls hanging 'round outside the gates don’t know you aren’t allowed to go near ‘em for the next three or so weeks.”
“Mhmm, seems like, uh, uh, ya don’t havta go off post to meet pretty girls.”
Elvis bit his lip again, enjoying how Bess became flustered and embarrassed, smoothing the sides of her dress. She reminded herself that she hated him, as she felt the butterflies swarm through her belly and make themselves at home, flitting willy nilly up her spine. Bess also became keenly aware of how hungry she was from skipping dinner. She didn’t have time for his teasing and looked Elvis squarely in the eyes as she spoke.
“I recommend staying away from them, too. Especially the WACs. You’re definitely not supposed to fraternize with other soldiers.”
Elvis looked off at the trees that lined the road to the right. “How bought civilians? Is, um, ah, frater-a-nizin', uh, allowed?”
Bess turned, ignoring the question, though she was unable to ignore the warm, playful flirtation in Elvis’ voice as it washed over her and her chest heaved up and down at a quicker pace. Once again she told herself that she did, indeed, know how to breath. Her annoyance at his line melted away when she returned to his eyes and saw the exhaustion underneath his bravado, instantly regretting what she was about to do before she even did it. Somehow she couldn’t help herself, it was as if she was having an out-of-body experience, watching herself fumble through a simple sentence.
“Listen, I, um, I just had the worst date of my life, at the worst restaurant. Couldn’t eat a bite. You help me get another type writer, and I’ll, I’ll fix us something to eat. Then you can sleep on my couch for a few hours.”
Watching his eyes light up, Bess felt the need to add. “But no funny business. I’m just helping out a new recruit, doesn’t mean anything.”
For the second time that night, Bess oversaw sneaking a broken typewriter into the repair shop and taking a new one, hobbling as she led Elvis to her car and directed him to put the stuff in her truck.
“Ya live on post?”
Bess patted the passenger seat of her blue Ford.
“Nope.”
“You know I ain’t supposed to leave?”
“Yup.”
“So — what’s the plan, stan?”
Bess turned to Elvis, removing his hand from her knee where it had somehow landed, and whispered with breathy excitement.
“I’m going to sneak you off.”
Elvis quirked his eyebrows as she kept talking.
“I, um, well, I share an office with the CO's secretary, Mabel. Who might actually be the most powerful person at this command. So, as long as I get you back in time for reveille, we’ll be fine. None of these guys will mess with me.”
“I, uh, I don’ wan no special privileges, I wanna, uh, be treated like any other man, any other soldier. I reckon I better -”
Elvis trembled when Bess touched his shoulder and rubbed it gently, looking up into his face with her big brown eyes, now tender and reassuring. He looked to her like he might cry as he spoke of not being special.
“Look, I would do this for any new recruit. Boot camp, uh. Well. This is the hardest part of being in the Army. I promise. I’m not offering because you’re famous. I actually kind of hate you, do you know how much trouble you cause my office? So, you should know I’m helping you in spite of who you are. Promise. I would - I would do it for any soldier in your predicament.”
Bess said this firmly to convince herself as much as to convince Elvis. Then she added a friendly wink and drove off, enjoying Elvis’ bemused smile and telling herself not to worry. Underneath her calm, confidence was the nagging thought that, unlike Elvis, Bess knew exactly what happened if some rule-minded officer were to find out that she had snuck Elvis off post. She had a good understanding of rule-minded officers. Like her father. Who, thankfully, was out of town.
******************************
The bacon and eggs sizzled on the stove and Bess flipped them, shyly avoiding Elvis’ gaze from where he was leaning with his back arched against the door jab, his right hip twisted up and his thumbs hanging from his belt loops as he watching her cook.
“So, uh, what’s a secretary doing taking typewriters uh, um, out late on a Friday night an a bringin' ‘em home for, huh?”
Bess shook her head into the frying pan, then met his gaze.
“I , um, I happen to have some very important work I need to do from home. For the General I work for. That’s, uh, why I have a master key.”
“Uh huh.” Elvis’ smirked, nodding his chin as he stuck his hands slowly under his armpits, and lifted one knee up to lean back further against the wall.
“Hand me your plate, dinner is ready.”
Elvis bounced off the doorway and strode slowly over to where Bess stood at the stove, his long arms dangling loosely at his side. He had become more relaxed and confident once they got to her house, after tearing up a bit in the car and telling her how much he missed his parents and home and how he didn’t have any idea what Germany would be like. He had then muttered on about how millions of guys have been through this, so he knew he’d be alright, though the tear dripping down his cheek made Bess think he believed the exact opposite. Now he was behind her, almost a different person, cocky and teasing as his strong arms snaked around her waist to steady her hands.
“Nah, see how the egg is still all jiggly wiggly, Bessie? S’not done, not nearly. Wanna get the bacon good and browned up, so’s there ain’t no more pink left.”
She flushed at the way his breath hit her neck while his words softly compelled her to make his food the way he liked it. The rumble of his voice as her nickname rolled off his tongue was an assault on her sense of decency, and she let his hands linger at her waist for another beat before lifting them off and assuring him that she understood.No jiggly wiggly, no pink. Black. That she learned, was how Elvis liked everything, and everything was what she gave him, as he ate the pound and a half of bacon om her fridge and her last six eggs.
Bess mused that sneaking a fatigued Elvis off post and filling him full of food must be what made him clingy, comfortable and forward when he put his arms around her as she led him upstairs to the guest room. Rubbing his eyes as he plopped on the bed, Elvis grabbed her wrist imploringly and begged her not to leave him all lonesome in a strange house, in a strange town, where she was the only nice 'lil gal to treat him like a real human bean. Sighing, Bess sat at the top of the bed and let Elvis lay his head in her lap, where she stroked his forehead, and, at his request, started to tell him her life story. He had passed out after five minutes, when she had barely finished detailing how her parents met at Coney Island in 1932, three years before she was born.
Elvis' eye lids fluttered closed and he mumbled, “That’s a when I was borned. Aww, Bessie boo, we musta been babies at the same time.”
Bess groaned as she couldn’t seem to pull herself away from him, and stayed there with his head in her lap for another twenty minutes, afraid if she rolled it off her lap she would wake him. She was cupping the back of his head to gently move it off her lap when he thrashed around and called out the name Satnin. This led Bess to give up and lean against the head board, reconciling herself to a night sleeping sitting up with the most famous rebellious heart throb soldier in the world calling out for his mama in her lap.
Elvis’ hands moved first at the sound of the alarm, roving over Bess tummy and breasts before he opened his eyes to the smacks of her hand hitting him off her. Somehow she had been pulled down into his arms over the course of the night, and she jumped up, commanding him to get his boots on while she ran down stairs and made some coffee. She prayed her younger sister hadn’t heard the alarm. Still wearing the dress from the night before, Bess watched Elvis gulp down his black coffee and chomp down the bread and cheese she had thrown at him to eat in the car. Loudly. With an open mouth. Wiping the crumbs from his mouth, he put his arm around her and squeezed.
Despite sleeping in his arms, Bess felt a shock and jolted at his touch.
“Just so we’re clear, Mister, uh, Private um Presley, uh, this was just a friendly, patriotic gesture. I wasn’t, uh um, trying to seduce you.”
Elvis arched his eyebrow, his expression one of amusement and incredulity at the idea Bess thought of her behavior seductive. The way she had hesitated spitting out the word ’seduce’ so earnestly was adorable and endearing.
“OK, honey, you’re the boss, jus do me a favor and call me Elvis, huh?”
She nodded, eyes forward in concentration as she felt him squeeze her shoulders even tighter. She left it there, and found herself relaxing and leaning back into him after a few minutes with a sigh. She couldn't help it, it was an instinctive response to the way his fingers widened and began to tap out a rhythm on the side of her arm. Everything felt good, and their two bodies melded together in the dusky morning twilight for a spell until a gate came into view and Bess jerked up to throw Elvis’ arm onto the car seat with a smack, not noticing how he, too, stiffened with trepidation.
She stopped around the block from Elvis’ barracks and met his strong, uninhibited bear hug with her body, letting him press the air out of her lungs and kiss her cheek.
“Hey, Bessie Boo, I,uh, I can’t, I don’t even, I uh, I hate to leave you, honey, I ain’t even had time to tell you what I want to say, what -”
Bess put her finger to his lips, feeling his breath as she shhhed him. His brows were furrowed and he frowned, not wanted to leave her car and return to the barracks. She rubbed her hand up his chest reassuringly.
“You only have five minutes to get into your bunk, Private Pres - Elvis.” She murmured. “Now, go be a good boy, I have an idea, for how to help you sleep in the future.”
“Hmmm, sounds fun.” A naughty expression played across his face, his jaw hung open and he waggled his eye brows.
Bess realized the insinuation and hit his arm.
“Not that.” She cocked her head towards the road. “You better go.”
“Huh, usually girls are tryin to run after me, not run me off.” She hit him again as he teased her. “Ok, ok baaaby. I’m off like a gun.”
Elvis face twisted into a crooked grin, and Bess felt like the sun was rising in her car, the earth was suddenly brighter when Elvis’ blue eyes beamed down at her and he kissed her goodbye. It was a light, sweet kiss aimed at her mouth but somehow missing and hitting the crease of her lips.
It had been, what, a year since she had been kissed? Bess kept her eyes closed, just enjoying the soft, tingling sensation of his mouth crushed into her face. Elvis’ hands gripped her tightly, one hand on her neck, the other at her back, and he moved as if to kiss her again. In a brief moment of clarity, Bess realized she had been fighting her attraction to Elvis all night. It had been gradual and immediate, and she felt very different being close to him then she did when she saw hm in the movies or on the TV and radio. At the back of her mind she could hear all the reasons she shouldn’t kiss him. She pushed her hand up between their lips.
“Um, hey, look. Think we could just be friends? I, uh, I have a rule. I don’t date soldiers.”
Elvis sat back, a quizzical expression softening on his face into a smile as he rubbed her shoulder.
“Sure, Bessie baby, friends. Got it.”
He clicked his tongue and grinned, shooting her a thumbs up. Bess nodded, unable to stop the flutter of her heart as she watched Elvis’ long legs carry him forward as he jogged around the corner to his bunk, pausing to look back over his shoulder at her with a goofy smile as he waved goodbye.
“Fuck a duck.” She heard herself mutter, as she put her car into gear and drove home to shower and get Elvis Presley out of her head.
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