The King and I

6 a.m. The clock radio comes to life and the morning newscaster sends his message through the static. "The king will be back tomorrow night," he says.

In my reluctant-to-face-the-world state I immediately jump to the conclusion that all the rumors about Elvis were true all along. He's not dead and tomorrow night he'll be on stage singing, "You ain't nothin' but a hound dog cryin' all the time." Behind my closed eyelids, he's wearing a white, bedazzled jumpsuit with his hair slicked back and he's doing that pelvic thrust move that nearly brought the country down. I try to calculate how old he would be now, but the math proves too difficult at 6 a.m.

Then in that hazy midland between wake and dreaming, I decide God must have sent out a press release over the AP wire. Jesus will arrive for the 2nd time tomorrow night. I conduct a brief inspection of my soul and inventory my transgressions and determine that this may not be the best time in my life for the Rapture. Readjusting my pillow to block out the annoying static from the radio, I send up a prayer asking for mercy and forgiveness.

But wait! My groggy brain returns to the Bi-Lo check-out lane where I vaguely remember reading the cover of a tabloid announcing the disappearance of Michael Jackson's body. Dr. Frankenstein, from somewhere in the deep recesses of my convoluted neural pathways, shouts, "It's alive!"

6:01 a.m. The morning newscaster's voice undulates with the static, as if he knows I'm still in bed and it is his sole objective to force me from between the sheets. He says, "Lebron James will blah, blah, blah, blah, blah."

Lebron James? Who died and made him king? I exasperatedly think.