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Chapter Seven


After we'd eaten some fried chicken and potatos that Lori brought out to the booth, Aiden led me down the length of the motel, which was set up so each room had its own door to the outside. She pointed out vending and ice machines, led me up a flight of stairs and down another long passage of doorways before pulling a key out of her pocket and opening a door. "Welcome to the Elvis Room," she said, turning on a light.

The inside of the room was decorated with crazy amounts of Elvis Presley merchandise.

"Man that's a lot of Elvis," I muttered. There were Elvis lamps, Elvis clocks, Elvis bedding, Elvis photos on the walls... Seriously, you name it, it had Elvis printed on it. "I didn't even know they made this much stuff with Elvis on it."

"Oh they make pretty much everything with Elvis on it," Aiden said. "Most of this is my collection from years of visiting Graceland."

"Is Graceland far?" I asked. If this stuff all came from it, it must be like another planet, I thought to myself. An Elvis-print planet.

"About two hours," Aiden answered. "If you'd like I can take you there sometime. If you're in town long enough, I mean."

I nodded. I didn't hope to be in town long enough to go anywhere with Aiden. "Well, thanks," I said, hoping she'd leave now that she'd showed me to the room.

She handed me the key. That, too, was printed with Elvis.

"Have a good night," she said.

"Night."

She left, and I let out a breath of relief because it was kind of exhausting talking to someone so long that wasn't Emma. I didn't have to try to be interesting or anything with Em, which was something I really appreciated. Sometimes trying to be interesting is just too much work.

I sat down on the bed. It was a water bed and it jiggled under me like a tub of Jell-O.

Dale had left my bags on the floor next to the bed, so I pulled one up and I opened it and rooted around inside it. It was a bunch of Em's clothes and stuff. I unzipped one of the end compartments and found a couple guns. Hand guns. And a ton of ammunition. I zipped it back up again. I hated Emma's guns.

I put the bag back down and grabbed the next one. This one was the one with our wedding photo in it, so I pulled that out and put it on the night stand, knocking over one of Elvis, which was in an Elvis frame. "Sorry buddy," I said, "You might be the King, but Emma's more important."

The next bag was the one she'd tossed our cell phone cords into. Finding her cord in the bag made me uneasy. I clicked my phone to check the battery charge. It was at the three-quarters mark and mine had spent the greater part of the day on the charger. Em's hadn't been plugged in that I knew of since she'd run off during dinner two nights before.

Maybe that was why she wasn't calling me back, I thought to myself. Maybe her phone battery died.

I plugged my phone back in, but the cord wasn't long enough to reach the plug and be close, so I turned the ring tone up to its loudest setting so I'd definitely hear it if it went off, and went back to rooting through the bags. Emma had packed a profound amount of underwear but not a lot of clothes. And she'd forgotten our tooth brushes and things like that. I ran my teeth over the inside of my mouth. I was going to have to go shopping first thing in the morning, I thought, or I'd have the breath of a dragon.

I pulled the Elvis print bedspread and sheets down and crawled in, putting my head on the Elvis pillow sham and staring up at the ceiling.

I hoped, wherever she was, that Emma was comfy and not laying on some plastic chairs in an airport terminal. I hoped she knew if she was next to me that I'd be whispering in her ear how much I love her right now. I hoped she knew it anyways.

I fell asleep.

I had a dream of Elvis Presley chasing me down a never-ending airport terminal.




Well Ali-Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezad-ie had a thousand tales...But master you're in luck 'cause up your sleeves, you got a brand of magic never fails.... You got some power in your corner now... some heavy ammunition in your camp.....

I groaned, I pulled the pillow over my head. I tried to ignore it. It couldn't possibly be a humane hour for anyone to be calling anyone else yet. No way was it before ten. The pillow felt funny. I opened my eyes. It felt funny because it wasn't mine. And it was bathed in sunlight and out the window wasn't New York City, it was a Nashville and it all came back to me.

Life is your restaurant and I'm your maitre d' - c'mon whisper what it is you want... you ain't never had a friend like me!

And that was my phone.

I rolled as quickly as I could out of bed and plodded across the room to the practically screaming cell phone. I heard the person next door knocking on the walls. I muted the phone and answered it quickly. It was a call from a blocked number. "Hello? Emma?" I said, hoping she was calling from a payphone or some borrowed cellphone.

"Jared? It's Seth."

Or Seth.

"Seth!" I cried. It wasn't Emma, but I was just so happy to hear from anyone connected to her and this whole mysterious situation that even Seth, who I kind of hated a little, was better than no communication at all.

He was quiet a moment. "Look, Jared, I can't get a hold of Em's phone, I'm guessing she let it die again. I can't talk long. Just -- tell Em I said to stay where you all are."

"What?"

"Stay wherever you are. Tell her not to come back to New York."

"But she isn't --"

"Tell her that I called."

"No, Seth, listen, she isn't --"

But the line went dead before I could tell him that Emma wasn't there.

I sank onto the bed, frustrated. I tried to dial star-six-nine but all I got was a message telling me that the caller had blocked the feature. I sighed and plugged my phone back in.

If Em wasn't with me, and she wasn't with Seth, where the hell was she?