I carry him on my chest and it’s a real tattoo and he was there like that when I come out of Mama. That was the week after he died, Elvis, and Mama made the mistake of letting folks know about it and there was that one big newspaper story, but she regretted it right away and she was happy that the city papers didn’t pick up on it. It was just as well for her that most people didn’t believe. She covered me up quick. Not more than one or two of her boyfriends ever knew—and there was many more than that come through in these sixteen years. The couple of them who saw me without my shirt and remarked on it thought she’d had it done to me, and she never said nothing about it being there when I was still inside her, and one of them got real jealous, as quite a few of them finally do for one thing or another, this one thinking that she was so much in love with Elvis that she had him tattooed on her son and that meant she was probably thinking about the King when the boyfriend and her was thrashing around on her bed, and she never said nothing to make him think that wasn’t so and he hit her and I just went out the door and off down the street to the river.
