Graceland

A boy arrives in the mail at the home of a lonely man. Unsure of his sanity, the man is thrust into a new reality.

The child came folded neatly in the mail, addressed to the man, no return address. Initially, wrongly, the man assumed it was a Christmas card from his worried mother, perhaps trying to keep a small light of hope flickering on his first Christmas without his wife. When he opened the envelope, the boy had been tightly folded, pleated flatly, a crease going right down his nose and mouth. The man stood dumbly in his kitchen, staring back at a flat blinking eye before he turned the uniformly creased letter over to another matching brown one. He yelped, tossing the note before promptly fainting, banging his head against the laminate counter on his way down. Out cold.

"Daddy? Daddy, wake up?" The man began to stir. Certainly, he was again in one of those dreams where a child he'd never known called out for him. The man realized the soreness of his forehead and felt the hardness of the kitchen floor. He realized, panic-stricken, that he wasn't on his futon.

"I'm hungry," a childish twang beckoned. He shot up. Before him stood a child, fully formed. While the man slept, the boy had inflated, burgeoning into bloom like a foam mattress topper out of the box. He wore a tailored white suit with matching flared white pants, his dark hair slicked back. "I want macaroni and cheese," the child said, then frowned.

The man blinked, then slapped his concussed head.

"What the devil!"

"That's not nice," the boy said. "I know what that means." The man gracelessly raised himself from the floor and leaned towards the child, his face screwed up in ugly confusion.

"What the fu-"

"That is a bad word, Daddy," the child said. "Are you okay? Your head is bleeding." The man put his fingers to his forehead and saw a red bloom of blood on his fingertips. "The Elvis said you might be confused, and that's okay. I need to be patient."

"Who the hell are you?"

"You're my Daddy," the boy said.

The man shivered, coming to in what he was sure was a psychotic break. "Aren't you too old to call someone 'Daddy'?" He asked, disturbed at his own mind's iteration. "What are you, like fourteen?"

"Eleven," the child straightened himself proudly, "And three-quarters."

"Why are you in my kitchen?"

"Because. You're. My. Daddy."

"Oh god, I've finally lost it. Oh good god," the man said, hunching over the counter, his head in his hands.

"Daddy, please don't cry," the boy said.

"I'm calling the police," the man said, eyeing over the boy's head and around the countertop, "Where's my phone?"

"I'm not a bad kid," the boy said.

"Not for you, idiot. For me. You're in my mind. You're me," the man replied. "I've finally lost it."

"Idiot' is a naughty word."

The man wasn't listening. He shuffled around the kitchen and then went to the couch, where he desperately threw cushions and blankets, "Where the hell is my phone?" He muttered.

The child sighed, "Daddy, I'm hungry."

“It was only a matter of time,” the man was muttering, “Jesus, I’m going to have to move in with my mom.” He paused and looked up at the child. “Oh Jesus Christ,” he wailed, before returning to flinging couch cushions across the floor.

“I would love to live with Grandma!” The boy cried merrily. “I bet she bakes really good cookies.”

"There it is," the man said, retrieving his phone, which had been trapped beneath cushions, untouched for days, with no new notifications.

"I love cookies," the boy continued.

"Stop--stop talking," the man moaned.

“Do you like chocolate chip? It’s my favorite.”

The man sat on the barren couch, the only thing he’d kept in the divorce. It was too big for his small apartment, and still had the small red stain from the time his ex-wife had laughed so hard she’d spilled. He lightly touched it.

“Everyone likes cookies,” the kid said behind him.

He dialed the police.

"911, what's your emergency?" A woman with a high-pitched voice asked. "Yes, hello? I need someone to come out. I'm having a psychotic break."

An aging police officer arrived at the door with a clearly green and youthful EMT behind him. The man had left the door ajar, and the policeman knocked twice on its frame, calling out. "

Yes, come in!" The man yelled. The child, who had given up on convincing the man to make him macaroni or agree with him on the philosophy of the cookie, had taken refuge on a camel-colored bean bag haphazardly thrown in the corner three months prior. The man had given him his phone to play Solitaire. The child had never played, so the man spent the better part of ten minutes explaining how the game worked before the police arrived. The kid was a natural, the man had to give him that. Now, the child sat contentedly and silent, absorbed in youthful attention.

When the two men entered, the man eagerly met them at the door. He had put on his coat, lined his pockets with his keys, phone, and wallet, and had laced up his shoes. “I need to go to the hospital,” he said. “Let’s go.”

"What seems to be the problem?" The officer asked, his hands placed gingerly on his belt buckle.

"I'm hallucinating," the man said. “It’s been a tough few months. Well, it’s been a tough two years. I need to see a doctor.”

The officer eyed his bleeding forehead. “For that?” He asked, pointing at the man’s head.

"What? No,” he put his hand to his head, “No, I'm seeing a kid. He’s behind me." The officer briefly eyed the EMT, whose eyes darted from the officer to behind the man. “He keeps asking for macaroni and talking about chocolate chip cookies. I don’t even like cookies.”

The child gasped behind him.

"You mean that child?" The EMT asked.

"Yes, that child. He isn't mine—” he paused and swung back to look at the kid, then, appalled, at the men. “You can see him?" The child looked up and waved.

"Sir, why don't you take a seat?" the EMT gestured to the strewn-about couch. In awe, the man followed and sat down. The EMT kneeled beside him. "You've got a pretty large gash on your head. Mind if I take a look?" The man nodded solemnly, glancing at the officer as he approached the child. The boy's eyes stayed glued to the phone until the officer knelt beside him.

"Hey, kiddo, how are you? Is that your father?" The child looked up, "Yes, that's Daddy."

"That is not my child!" The man exclaimed.

"Sir, look at me, please." The EMT lightly grabbed the man's head. "Follow the light." He clicked on a narrow flashlight and shined it into his brown eyes. Five minutes later, the man was deemed concussed. The man listened as the officer questioned the boy. The kid was prattling on about how he’d always wanted a daddy and now he had one.

“Were you adopted?” The officer asked, “You can’t take it personally that your dad isn’t feeling well. He’s hit his head.”

“Oh I know, I saw him fall. He’s just getting used to me.”

“Smart kid,” the officer reassured him.

“I’d like to take you to the hospital to be checked out,” the EMT said. “You were right to call. When will your wife be home?" He asked, briefly eyeing the man’s ring.

"Soon," the man lied.

After six months, he still couldn't come to grips with the truth that she never again would be.

“I…I think I’ll stay.” If they could see the child, he reasoned, he was either hallucinating them altogether, or the child in his apartment was real. He wasn’t sure which was more terrifying.

The officer's radio garbled out a hit-and-run three miles away. He unclicked his walkie-talkie. "10-4," he said. The EMT cleared his throat, "Alright. You and your wife will need to monitor your symptoms. If you experience vomiting, a worsening headache, or your confusion continues, you'll need to be checked out."

"He came in the mail," the man mumbled.

The older officer nodded. “My niece was adopted. It’s a beautiful thing to take in a child and raise them as your own. You’ll adjust.” The radio garbled again. "Call us if you need anything.” They took their leave.

As the man watched them walk down the pathway outside his apartment, he mumbled, “He was in an envelope.”

The child looked up, setting the phone beside him. "Why'd you lie about the lady coming here?"

The man put his hands over his face. "What?" He said through his palms. "Oh. I don’t know.”

“I know she isn't coming here," the boy retorted. The man lowered his hands.

“How?” Then it dawned on him.

Though his wife was not cruel nor a prankster, it was the only possibility. Perhaps this was a trick, some overdone commentary on the dissolution of their marriage. She'd said on their first date that she'd never wanted children, and the man, who wanted nothing more than to be a father, thought she'd change her mind. As time progressed, he decided he would instead. He'd never met a better woman. He tucked his desires away, neatly folded and sealed. But as their marriage pressed on, the desire bloomed, pushing outside the edges, spilling into conversations that devolved into fights, corroding the bond, ending the marriage.

"Don't you want me?" She'd asked, tears in her eyes. He did, but he wanted something else, too. It was hopelessly complicated, tangled, and painful. The day he'd broken their hearts, a record spun in the background as they sat across one another.

I'll have a blue Christmas without you

I'll be so blue just thinking about you

Decorations of red on a green Christmas tree

Won't be the same dear, if you're not here with me

But I'll have a blue, blue, blue, blue Christmas

He gave her everything in the divorce, packed what little he had, and found a one-bedroom apartment filled only with silence and ugly furniture from his mother's garage and the flea market. That and the wine-stained couch.

"I hope you get to be a father one, day," she'd told him, "You'd be a great one." And then she was gone.

"What do you know about it?" The man asked the boy. The boy stood and walked to the one counter stool, sitting atop it so his legs dangled. "The Elvis said that you’ve been good. You’re a good man, Daddy."

"The who?"

"The Elvis of the North." The man blinked. "The North Pole," the child said. The man guffawed.

"Are you saying elves?" The child nodded. "Oh dear freaking lord." The child pursed his lips.

"If the Elvis knew how naughty you spoke, I don't know if they'd have sent me here." The man lowered himself to the floor, sitting criss-crossed, and again put his head into his hands. "But they told me how good you are," the boy said. "Like when you gave a homeless man your last twenty dollars." The man cracked his head up. There was no way the child could know that, that anyone could know that. Three weeks ago, instead of buying himself beer, smokes, and pizza, he'd given a war-torn man the last bill in his wallet. He went home and made a smoothie.

"I'm hungry," the child said.

"Who told you that?"

"Told me what?"

"About the homeless man... the twenty dollars?"

"I told you, Daddy. The Elvis." The man nodded, blinking. "Santa and the Elvis."

The man grumbled. "Santa? The EMT should have looked at you."

"Santa is the King," the boy said, "And he really likes Elvis." He jumped from the stool and started swiveling his hips. "You guys call it the North Pole, but we call it Graceland." The boy danced over him as he sat baffled on the floor. “He likes Dolly Parton, too. But he loves Elvis. So the elves call themselves the Elvis.” The man was speechless. “And Santa says, the North Pole is where we can find grace for people when they need it the most. Naughty and nice.”

The man gaped. “So you’re…”

“You’re my Daddy,” the boy chirped. “And daddies feed their hungry sons.”

The man reached up and gripped his hand around the counter, pulling himself to his feet. He dragged himself around it into the kitchen, pulling out a pot and filling it with tap water.

"So, you want me to believe that elves made you in some lab--or some toy factory?"

The kid shrugged. "I don't know how babies are made," he said. "That's your job to teach me."

"What's your name?"

"Rudolph."

The man put the pot down in the sink. "Like the red-nosed reindeer? C'mon." The kid bit his lip and scowled.

"Red-nosed-reindeers aren't real, Daddy," he said indignantly, as though the man was irrevocably naive.

"Jesus Christ."

"Santa," the boy retorted.

The man picked up the pot and began to salt the water. "So Santa and his elves sent you." The man stirred the pot, "And so you're here...by what? God's...grace? And I’m not having a psychotic break. I’m fine. I’m totally fine. Jesus Christ.”

"Santa," the boy reiterated. “C’mon, Daddy. Santa's grace.” They sat in silence until the noodles came to a boil. Then the boy said, “I came with a note. Didn’t you read it?” The man, who had been straining the noodles, set down the pot and strainer. He walked towards the boy and looked under the stool. Surely enough, there was a small red parchment. He bent and grabbed it. It was written out like lyrics, each sentence beneath the next:

We're lost in a cloud

With too much rain

We're trapped in a world

That's troubled with pain

But as long as a man

Has the strength to dream

He can redeem his soul

And fly

The man recognized the lyrics to If I Can Dream by Elvis Presley. He thought of all the dreams of the child he’d never have, then he looked at the boy. “I’m hungry,” the boy said. The man turned to the fridge and retrieved the butter, gingerly adding it to the noodles. He searched his fridge. "All I have is parmesan," he told the boy.

"That's fine!" He said cheerily.

The man fixed him a bowl and put it in front of him. “So, you’re what? My kid now?” The boy took a large bite of his food and nodded, smiling.

“No more Blue Christmases for Daddy,” he said. The man leaned onto his elbows on the counter and eyed the strange child.

“And you want that? To live here with me and have me…be your dad?”

The child nodded contentedly, staring into his macaroni. “I’ve been waiting for you,” he said, his mouth full. “I’ve always wanted a daddy. Now, you’re mine.” The child chewed the noodles loudly, "Don't you want me?" He asked. The man sat still a moment.

There it was, that question posed to him again, the second time this year. This time, he knew he could answer, leaving no broken hearts in his midst. It didn't have to be complicated.

He looked back at the card. Below the lyrics, in cursive, the note continued: "Take good care of Rudolph. We'll be watching."

The man looked at the ceiling to God, Santa, Elvis, or whoever was giving him grace. Rudolph began to hum, “You'll be doing all right with your Christmas of white, but I'll have a blue, blue, blue, blue Christmas.”

"I do want you, Rudolph," the man said, looking at the boy. The child smiled, noodles mashed up between his teeth. The man noticed for the first time that the kid was kinda cute.

"Do you really not like cookies?"

"I can grow to like cookies," the man chuckled. "No problem." Contented, Rudolph turned back to his bowl of pasta as his father watched, mentally noting all he'd need to prepare to make his house a home for the boy. Most notably, baking ingredients.

The man turned his eyes back to the sky and said, “Thank you, thank you very much.”