It's Up To You

Chapter 24

Under those sheets, Elvis spoke about the current film he was making. I felt so close to him as we laid together under those sheets. Our conversation was cut short with the ringing of the phone.

Reaching over, he picked it up off the bedside table and pressed the receiver to his ear. "Hello?"

The person on the other end began speaking. I could hear the humming of their voice from the phone, but I couldn't make out the words. Their voice was high pitched and bubbly.

It was a girl.

"I can't talk right now." Elvis' voice got deeper as he turned to face the side table. He held onto the phone with both hands with his back turned to me. In order to get closer to hear, I scooted my body closer to him then wrapped an arm around him. While kissing his ear, I began listening in on whether or not it was a girl.

"Alright, Lauren." He whispered to me then stroked my hair, almost to say that's enough.

I heard someone yell out my name. "Lauren!?" The person on the phone shouted. Then, the voice became even more high pitched and sped up, as if they were bickering.

"Alright... no... it's just— Pr— stop. You know that's not it. You know that's not the case. What? You want me to say that? Right now? I cant. Come on..." Elvis began to plead to the person on the phone. Suddenly, the line went dead. Elvis looked at the phone receiver that now had a dial tone noise, then hung it up.

"Who was that?" I asked as Elvis turned himself back toward me.

"It's not important, it's fine baby, don't worry about it." He placed his hand on the side of my waist and began stroking up and down.

"It sounded important." I rose a brow. Elvis sucked in a tense breath and squeezed my waist along with it.

Then, he pulled me closer to his body. "It was just somebody from the studio. No big deal."

He leaned into kiss me but I pulled back.

"Lauren, what has gotten into you? What we did was just beautiful yet here you are acting as if I'm a stranger." Elvis furrowed his eyebrows.

"My issue is that you obviously have a girl calling you and you're close enough where she feels it's exclusive! I heard her ask who I am." I crossed my arms.

"No, she said your name. Technically I'm not supposed to be dating anyone besides Juliet." Elvis leaned up on his elbow as he laid on his side.

"Who's Julia?" I asked in a stern tone.

"She's my co-star, Juliet Prowse." He insisted as he laid there naked. I couldn't believe I let him touch me when he obviously still had others.

"Never heard of her." I lifted my head up high.

"Baby, she's new to the scene." He explained to me. "I need to be careful, a girlfriend can ruin my image... especially a..."

"A what?" I asked.

He froze.

Getting out of bed, tears began filling in my eyes. His face was now beet red as he quickly began following me. "Woah, woah, woah, calm down."

"I can't calm down! Here you are showing me exactly what I am to you! A toy that you're ashamed of!" I shouted out to him as I leaned my back up against a wall.

"I'm not ashamed of you..." He tried to tell me.

"You must be! You know we could never go public with our relationship!" I began crying even more.

"Honey, even if you were white we'd still have to keep this under wraps." Elvis reminded me. My tears began to lessen, I sniffled my nose. "How can I prove to you that I care?"

"Stop seeing the other girls!" I got loud at him once again.

"Juliet is my colleague!" He reminded me once again. Flustered, I stomped my foot.

"That's not what I mean!" I whined out. "I mean the girl you were talking to in Germany?"

"What girl?" Elvis asked with a smile.

"The girl who is in the photos of you at the base." I told him.

"Girl at the base? There were many girls at the base, Lauren." Elvis rubbed the back of his neck. He knew he was full of bullshit and so did I.

"The one with the scarf over her head." I said in a low tone. He looked at me for a moment as he thought of what he could tell me to coax the situation.

"Ohhh." He said as he looked up at the ceiling. "Her!"

"Her. Who is she?" I asked him. He stepped closer, pressing his body up against mine as I leaned on the wall.

"It's nobody, she was just some American girl who was lonely in Germany and I kept her company." Elvis placed his hands on my hips.

"I didn't know you were the go to for oversea American girls to find emotional refuge." I squinted up at him and he chuckled.

"She's just a friend." He shrugged as he pulled me closer to him and off the wall. "Trust me."

I knew better than to believe that story, but something in my heart wanted to believe the lie. I exhaled then wrapped my arms around him, pulling him into a kiss.

"And sure, I can't show you off to the world, but what I can do is show you off to the ones I love." Elvis nodded as he looked down at me with his dark lashes.

"And when would you do that?" I bit my lip with a smirk.

"Why don't you come down to Graceland with me? You can properly meet my family this time and get well aquatinted." He smiled down at me.

"I don't have plane tickets." I smiled at him.

"I can get you those." He pressed his nose to mine. "I'll give you the world, Lauren. Just give me a chance to."